RSS Feed
July 8th, 2016 
Awake Goy When drug kingpin Pablo Escobar was killed by the Colombian National Police in 1993, he left a vast and bloody legacy in his wake. The Medellín Cartel boss is regarded as one of the most prolific criminals in history, and is notorious for having built a cocaine-fueled empire on the bodies of thousands of murdered individuals.
But El Patrón is also remembered by more than 50 hippopotamuses (Hippopotamus amphibius) that currently roam free near his palatial estate, Hacienda Nápoles. Escobar’s captive hippos were never meant for the rivers and estuaries of northern Colombia, yet since his death they’ve behaved as wild animals are wont to: by vigorously breeding and multiplying, slowly establishing themselves as the largest invasive species in the world.
Today, it appears their troublesome reign is nowhere near ending because no one really knows how to stop them.
A herd of hippos swimming at Hacienda Nápoles. Image: Flickr/FICG.mx
Over the 30 years following Escobar’s death, herds have reportedly broken through the compound’s fences into nearby waterways, such as the Magdalena River. Last year, one of them was spotted meandering around a local elementary school. And although government officials assure that no human casualties have occurred, farmers and fishermen working in Puerto Triunfo are afraid to go near them.
But the private administrators who currently operate Hacienda Nápoles as a theme park aren’t eager to cull or move the pachyderms. In 2009, a bull named “Pepe” was shot and killed by Colombian Army soldiers, igniting debates between rightfully concerned ecologists and those who view the charismatic megafauna as harmless curiosities. Scientists who study South America’s rivers are worried the hippos might one day topple the region’s delicate ecosystems.
Read More…
Source Article from http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blacklistednews/hKxa/~3/n-ZQ-aldBOA/M.html
Posted in 
Tags: 
